him, I suppose."

"Not at all," said the padre. "I got him something to eat and a couple
of blankets. That mortuary is a cold place, and, though you mightn't
think it, a coffin is draughty. Next morning I buried him."

"God bless me!" said the A.P.M. explosively. "Do you mean to say you
buried a man you knew to be alive?"

"Couldn't help it," said the padre. "It was in orders, matter of
discipline, you know. Can't go back on discipline, can you, Mackintosh?
I got through it as quickly as I decently could. Then I let Binny out
The graves in that cemetery are never filled in for an hour or two after
the coffins are let down, so I had lots of time. Jolly glad poor Binny
was to get out. He said he'd shivered all over when he heard 'The Last
Post.' I had a suit of clothes for him; of course, civilian clothes."

The padre filled himself a glass of whisky and soda and lit his pipe.
He looked round with a smile of triumph. Most of us applauded him. He
deserved it The story was one of his best imaginative efforts. I suppose
the applause encouraged him to go further.

"I'll give you his address if you like," he said to the A.P.M. "He's
working on a French farm and quite happy. But I don't see that you can
possibly arrest him without getting the whole medical profession on your
back. They said he was dead, you see, and, as Mackintosh will tell you,
they never own up to making mistakes."

IV ~~ THE SECOND BASS

"Be careful, Bates," said Miss Willmot; "we don't want your neck
broken."

"No fear, miss," said Lance-Corporal Bates; "I'm all right."

Lance-Corporal Bates had three gold bars on the sleeve of his tunic.
He might fairly be reckoned a man of courage. His position, when Miss
Willmot spoke to him, demanded nerve. He stood on the top rail of the
back of a chair, a feeble-looking chair. The chair was placed on a table
which was inclined to wobble, because one of its legs was half an inch
shorter than the other three. Sergeant O'Rorke, leaning on the table,
rested most of his weight on the seat of the chair, thereby balancing
Bates and preventing an upset. Miss Willmot sat on the corner of the
table, so that it wobbled very little. Bates, perilously balanced,
hammered a nail, the last necessary nail, into the wall through the
topmost ray of a large white star. Then he crept cautiously down.

Standing beside Miss Willmot he surveyed the star.

"Looks a bit like Christmas, don't it, miss?" he said.

"The gli